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Month: February 2016

Materials, matter and the things we use respond to, and sometimes allow, our bodies to move and work. What we ‘create’ cannot entirely be understood in terms of a human intention working upon the world, but rather a collaboration with things from within a world.

habituated practice can just hide a larger more complex process of working with materials. if we just act without thinking what is really involved then are we really learning?

we usually go into creating something with a pre conceived plan of what the outcome might be and the materials we need to make it.

We looked into hylomorphism and analysed that in the creation process there is the matter and the form, the matter being the material you are using and the form being the arrangement you put it in. we discussed that working in this method means you pre-devise a chronological way of thinking in order to carry out procedures.

we then analysed making as growing and how it is theorised “I want to think of making, instead, as a process of growth. This is to place the maker from the outset as a participant in amongst a world of active materials. These materials are what he has to work with, and in the process of making he ‘joins forces’ with them, bringing them together or splitting them apart, synthesising and distilling, in anticipation of what might emerge” (Ingold, 2013, p. 21).

During the past week I have been taking part in a collaborative field project, my group consisted of a Product Designer, Illustrator, Ceramicist, and a Graphic Designer (Myself) in a project where we were tasked to create a manifesto and a Power point presentation based on what we personally think an art school is supposed to be, an the rules we would implement if we were the coordinators of our own art School.

Collaboratively we came up with a manifesto;

Art is Equal.

Although we are equal, as artists we are not the same.

The only limits in life are the ones that you set for yourself.

Art should be fun and enjoyable.

Don’t get hung up on expectations.

We also produced a prototype concept as collaborative piece of art to reference our ideas for an art school, which related to our presentation.

We aimed to highlight importance of collaboration and feedback between your course peers and other those working among other professions, because their work can possibly influence yours and help you make improvements upon it.

Here is the power point presentation that we came up with to evaluate our aims.

Today we had a very interesting lecture on materials and how when we use them we can essentially become one with them, repeated practice and use forms maps in your mind of how to correctly co-ordinate and balance yourself to incorporate for this added albeit temporary extension of your body in order to work better in tandem with the world and the objects around us, I believe that this can also be incorporated into design and the way a painter uses his brushes eventually developing a better understanding and progressing as an artist.

We believe that the body is self corrective striving to better itself with the use of tools developing muscle memories, another interesting theory is that people don’t have to end at their biological matter they can adopt new innovative ways to become more through the use of prosthetics or even a blind person using a stick to be able to safely navigate with less inhibitions than before.

Describe an object you view as Ambiguous

Personally I would describe a mirror as an ambiguous object, mainly due to the fact that no matter how you look at it, something will always be different, it has no set form either. Mirrors can be of all shapes and sizes, created to distort images such as the ones you find in carnivals that may give you a large head, make you fatter or thinner etc.

In this case their is no way you can give a globally accurate depiction of a mirror, only the image that you personally identify it by, you see what you expect to see based on the experience, your surroundings, the angle at which you are observing, if you are observing through a transparent object or do you have clear sight? Are you visually impaired or viewing from your peripheral vision? All these factors can affect the way you would view a mirror.

I feel that ambiguity is necessary to spark interest and differences in opinion among objects, and I also believe that there has to be an active relationship between the viewer and the object, to produce multiple interpretations there has to be variation and experimentation to fuel any sort of ambiguity. Further development is impossible if you come at it with a one sided approach and say “I looked into the mirror and saw myself, therefore a mirror is used to look at your reflection” when there are multiple uses and ideologies for what you see.

For example you don’t use the wing mirrors on your car to check whether your hair is looking good or if you have some food in your teeth, it has a function and a purpose but still provides multiple uses depending on how you interact with it yourself.

In conclusion I personally feel that for a mirror to be considered an unambiguous object, we would all have to have the same experience, without the idea of it being a projected perception unique to the viewer.

Session Notes

Selective perception, invisible gorilla video.
What you attend to is what you perceive as reality, not necessarily is physically in front of you.

The world is as I expect it: Imagination, Ambiguity and Perception.

Aims: to think about the statement ^^ and the ways in which our imagination plays a constructive role in how we perceive the world.Constructive Perception

Ambiguity

“Double realities” we mechanically pick up data from the richly detailed world. The visual field is created from brief snapshots. We see a stable world out there, yet out eyes are in constant movement.
Scotoma (blind spot) in the visual field present in normal people’s eyes
there are many features of the world that are not signalled by the eyes our through touch

Primary (objective) qualities – Secondary (Subjective) qualities

There is no colour in the world outside of the way that we perceive it

Perception of visual illusions reflecting upon your mental thought.
Neurological model of perception: The history and development of our individual neurosystems

Are we really just meat sacks? Isn’t there something more? What about Imagination?

Two competing theories debating whether the mind is used in relation to the brain or the brain is used in relation to a reaction from the mind

What we imagine can be very real; for any stimulus, be it visual or auditory, a biomorphic cause of a definite and intelligible nature is projected which enables the mind to take defensive measures, such stimuli arouse anxieties among savages or children who may project into such sounds the image of a snarling dog. (Warburg cites in Gombrich, 1970)

Perception is ‘Projective’ we always depict what is ‘familiar to us’ – our drawing reveal our imagination at work.

‘The World’ is inherently ambiguous?
We see what we expect to see
what we expect to see is contingent to our prior experiences
there is no innocent eye, it is always relevant to past experiences

All images are ‘potential Images’ they become real when perceived by the beholder and interpreted in different ways by different people

TASK – FIND AN OBJECT THAT YOU SEE AS ABMIGUOUS AND DESCRIBE HOW SO TO ANOTHER PERSON, AND DECIDE WHAT IT WOULD TAKE TO FURTHER TURN IT INTO AN OBJECT

Blog 300+ words

Trace and describe how everyday images, objects and artefacts can be understood as ambiguous, which describing an active relationship between the work and the viewer.

During our campaign project each member of our group of four was assigned a different role based on how we all felt we were best suited to approaching the assignment.

I was assigned to the online aspects of our project, and created a website, as well as social media pages for our campaign.

I went through a few different styles and attempts at the website before deciding on a final outcome with my team, my alternative designs were based off feedback from my team and from the tutors during our critical evaluation.

These were my finished web pages and social media pages.

Based on the feedback received from tutors, me and my group members felt that this website design worked best out of all the designs I came up with. Here are some of my other designs I created prior to our evaluation and advice from tutors.

We agreed that these styles may appear a bit dated due to the nature of the site we were portraying and decided to go for a more simplistic approach and make use of some negative space rather than having a large image background.
I felt that I made appropriate changes according to the feedback and produced my contribution of the project at a good standard.

The powerpoint for our full group presentation can be found here, where we all talked about our individual contributions and reasoning for what we created.